About our e-newsletters
- Free e-newsletters
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- We do not share your e-mail address
Housecall, our weekly general-interest e-newsletter, keeps you up to date on a wide variety of health topics with timely, reliable, practical information, recipes, blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts and more. Our biweekly topic-specific e-newsletters also include blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts, and other useful information that will help you manage your health.
Housecall Archives
Mayo Clinic Housecall
Stay up to date on the latest health information.
What you get
- Free weekly e-newsletter
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- Recipes, tools and other helpful information
- We do not share your e-mail address
Symptoms
By Mayo Clinic staff
Signs and symptoms of hammertoe and mallet toe may include:
- A hammer-like or claw-like appearance of a toe
- In mallet toe, a deformity at the end of the toe, giving the toe a mallet-like appearance
- Pain and difficulty moving the toe
- Corns and calluses resulting from the toe rubbing against the inside of your footwear
Both hammertoe and mallet toe can cause pain with walking and other foot movements.
When to see a doctor
See your doctor if you have foot pain that's persistent and that affects your ability to walk properly and carry out other motions with your foot. Also, see your doctor if one or more of your toes has developed a clenched or claw-like appearance.
- Hammertoe. American College of Foot and Ankle Surgeons. http://www.footphysicians.com/footankleinfo/hammertoes.htm. Accessed June 24, 2010.
- Hammer toe deformity. The Merck Manuals: The Merck Manual for Healthcare Professionals. http://www.merck.com/mmpe/sec04/ch043/ch043m.html. Accessed June 24, 2010.
- Klein SE. Conditions of the forefoot. In: DeLee JC, et al. DeLee and Drez's Orthopaedic Sports Medicine. 3rd ed. Philadelphia, Pa.: Saunders Elsevier; 2009. http://www.mdconsult.com/book/player/book.do?method=display&type=bookPage&decorator=header&eid=4-u1.0-B978-1-4160-3143-7..00025-7--s2255&displayedEid=4-u1.0-B978-1-4160-3143-7..00025-7--boxsec40&uniq=206941847&isbn=978-1-4160-3143-7&sid=1016949770. Accessed June 24, 2010.
- Laskowski ER (expert opinion). Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn. July 8, 2010.
Find Mayo Clinic on